And yet, though she had been disdained, abandoned, and repulsed, she was
no longer free.
She belonged to the man whose name she bore like a badge of
servitude--to the man who hated her, who fled from her.
She was not yet twenty; and this was the end of her youth, of her life,
of her hopes, and even of her dreams.
Society condemned her to solitude, while Martial was free to rove
wheresoever fancy might lead him.
Now she saw the disadvantage of isolating one's self. She had not been
without friends in her school-girl days; but after leaving the convent
she had alienated them by her haughtiness, on finding them not as high
in rank, nor as rich as herself. She was now reduced to the irritating
consolations of Aunt Medea, who was a worthy person, undoubtedly, but
her tears flowed quite as freely for the loss of a cat, as for the death
of a relative.
But Blanche bravely resolved that she would conceal her grief and
despair in the recesses of her own heart.
She drove about the country; she wore the prettiest dresses in her
_trousseau_; she forced herself to appear gay and indifferent.
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